


Pure by Night

by crimson_adder



Category: Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Case Fic, Gothic, Halloween, Knotting, M/M, Rough Sex, Sensational Literature, Supernatural Elements, Transformation, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-01
Updated: 2014-11-29
Packaged: 2018-02-23 12:34:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 21,134
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2547647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crimson_adder/pseuds/crimson_adder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Madman, as in 'lunatic'; from the Old French <i>lunatique</i>, in turn heralding from Late Latin, <i>lunaticus</i>, meaning 'moonstruck'. Yes, a popular theory, especially given the etymology, but one ultimately without factual basis. The moon is just the moon, and lunar cycles – which I have well enough knowledge of," Holmes said as an aside, "have no bearing on the character of a man. The moon controls the tides, and nothing more."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mistyzeo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mistyzeo/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HALLOWEEN. this is a halloween story. for halloween. ignore the fact that halloween was yesterday, why don't you?

_"Even a man who is pure in heart_  
_And says his prayers by night_  
_May become a wolf_  
_When the wolfbane blooms_  
_And the autumn moon is bright"_

\- The Wolf Man (1941) 

* * *

DOG ATTACKS IN WEST LONDON REMAIN A MYSTERY, heralded the newspaper, frantic with old news.

The morning was cold and blustery, with a crisp, white disk of a sun breeching the pale clouds that roiled across the heavens with unnatural speed. The world seemed to be frozen, immobile as the skies slipped past, silent but for the wind. Inside Baker Street the seclusion was even more complete, though not unwanted. Though the light was gloomy the air was warm and quiet, save the crackle of fire in the hearth, and the shuffle of papers, and it smelled of toast and tobacco.

"No one has seen a wild dog in a month," muttered Sherlock Holmes with an extravagant sigh. He was draped dramatically across his armchair, listless with boredom. "The papers – and myself – grow tragically dull when lacking stimulation, and not a criminal to be caught." He slipped a little more sideways, and continued to ignore his morning coffee.

John Watson let the newspaper drop and folded it twice before laying it down beside his empty breakfast plate. He had been ravenous when he'd woke, and had eaten nearly twice his usual breakfast, eggs and sausage and all. He raised his eyebrows at Holmes. "And good riddance, too." 

"Yes my dear boy," said Holmes with a note of concern, "How is your arm this morning?"

"It's doing well enough, I thank you" answered Watson, pulling back the cuff of his shirtsleeve. The bandage underneath was clean and white, which was indeed a refreshing sight from the stiff and stained mess of the previous month. The dog bite had infected and festered for over a week and left him delirious and Holmes near skeletal from self-neglect as he tended to Watson's fevers. Between the two of them, neither wished to repeat the performance. "Though it aches fiercely this morning, I think it's nearly healed."

"Excellent," said Holmes. His grey eyes were sharp for a hint of deception, but upon receiving no such signals, he reclined once more and took up his melancholy prattle on the state of criminals in the greater London metropolitan area. "Three nights in a row of rampaging wild animals within the city limits, and then nothing at all! By Jove, I had thought there was something there for a moment, but alas, the hazards of theorizing without all the facts, I only set myself up for disappointment."

"What did you think of the attacks? Some brutal reenactment of the Baskerville affair?" Watson's bite was the least of the injuries to come from the attacks; three people had been mauled by the dogs – over the course of three nights – and none had survived the following dawn. Three or four others had claimed to have seen the animals, but their accounts failed to provide any concrete facts, mere impressions of terror and the image of something great and hulking stalking through the night.

But Holmes shook his head with a scowl. "Oh nothing so complicated as that," he mourned languorously. "Baskerville was only possible because of the history, the legend – and because of a distinct letting go of rational thought by all parties involved." He snorted. "No, this had the signs of some dog fighting ring gone out of control – though, clearly not enough of the signs, of I would have solved it when we first became involved. The aggression towards monied individuals, indicating a specific target for malice; the precise locations in seemingly random dark alleys, close to bars and pubs with reputations of the same sort; the sheer brutality of the attacks – remember, the Hound of the Baskervilles never actually laid a hand on – or, rather, teeth in, any one of its victims: the entire scenario was of a psychological attack over a physical one. But no. Not a single of the many trails I had thought to follow connected in any way to the type of crime I assumed I was witnessing." Holmes rose from his armchair to stand looking stoic in the cold light of the window. "This is my own fault. I never should have let myself get carried away. No –" he turned, "It's your fault."

Watson startled. "My fault? I beg your pardon, my dear, but I fail to see how any of this is my fault."

"If you hadn't been injured, I never would have lost my head." Holmes had a twinkle in his eye that belied the accusation in his voice.

"If you hadn't gotten us involved in the first place, I never would have been injured," sniped Watson, with only a hint of actual scorn. Willing enough to lay his life down for Holmes, eager to follow him into the most dangerous situations, to offer himself however Holmes wanted him, in every single way, yes. Complacent in the face of mockery, not nearly so.

Holmes noticed.

"Oh come now dear boy," he said. He picked his way across the detritus of the sitting room – the weeks of inactivity had taken their toll on the entirety of the flat – and cupped Watson's face in his long thin hands. "You know how I rely on you: I am nothing without you. But you have to admit you are quite the distraction for even the sharpest of minds." He said this with a narrow smile that made his cheeks crinkle with restrained pleasure.

Watson rolled his eyes. He tilted his face to press a small kiss against the inside of Holmes' wrist, and then pulled away. He shook the newspaper out again and feigned interest in the reports of new electric cars being developed for the Underground, no doubt a fascinating matter if not for the long fingers creeping about the inner edges of his collar. Watson growled, low and rumbling, and Holmes took his hands away with a startled laugh, just in time for the door to open and a small old man with a large box to enter unceremoniously.

"Good morning, gentlemen," he cried enthusiastically upon seeing the occupants of the room. It took a moment for Watson to recognize the man as Peter Rains, the client of a previous case, some two months before; the last time he had seen Rains the man had been hollow eyed from exhaustion and raving of persecution. With Holmes' help, they had determined the paranoia plaguing the small man to be genuinely founded in rival scientists determined to discredit Rains and his practices. 

Holmes made a pleased noise. "Ah! Mr. Rains, welcome! Whatever brings you here this morning? No more trouble with the Camden Town Astronomers, I trust?" He did not sound worried, for together they had cleared the matter up precisely, but visit was entirely unexpected, and he could not deny his curiosity.

Mr. Rains shook his head. "No no, nothing of the sort. I have brought you a gift, Mr. Holmes; for you and the Doctor." He held out the box, which was long and narrow, and wrapped in brown paper, and brandished it at them eagerly. 

Holmes shook his head. "Mr. Rains, you have paid me in full; our agreement was mutually concluded. I have no wish to receive a gift given as though you feel indebted –"

But Mr. Rains interrupted. "Mr. Holmes, money is of no import now. Money is not nearly enough for me to thank you. This comes so late because I ordered it special, and it took time for completion and customization, but even so it arrived just in time. I give you this freely; and I do so hope you will accept it!"

Holmes and Watson exchanged a glance. Mr. Rains pushed the package eagerly into Holmes' hands, and urged him backwards to lay it out on his desk. The brown paper tore under Holmes' fingers and Mr. Rains' enthusiastic assistance, revealing a sleek leather box, hinged along one axis. The box held a smooth, beautiful, brass telescope, and the structures for a tripod stand. 

Watson's breath caught in his throat. It was a stunning piece of craftsmanship, and Watson was always more given to appreciating the beauty of the universe over Holmes, who was considerably more interested in the uglier sides. "Why Mr. Rains," he whispered, reaching out to hover his fingers just above the shining polished surface of the telescope, "This is beautiful." 

Mr. Rains beamed. "It is an astronomer's telescope," he explained. With careful hands he plucked the instrument from the velvet padding. He turned it over and over, pointing out the features and dials, the angles of the lenses and the convex curves to the glass. He handed it to Watson directly, and added "It arrived finished with impeccable good timing too! This Friday is supposed to be a wondrous full moon – the perigee-syzygy of the Earth-Moon-Sun system – and I know you'll both enjoy the sight through such a piece as this!"

Watson thanked him profusely, and escorted Mr. Rains from the room politely, but firmly, while Holmes inspected the telescope for himself. 

Holmes was peering out the window at some far-distant spectacle when Watson returned, having shaken off the enthusiastic old man.

"Well, that's a fine gift, isn't it?" said Watson, with a laugh. "And a full moon! I'm certain you of all people will appreciate that the moon drives men to madness, eh?" It was a joke, but something Watson more of less believed in, as it was common knowledge held as more or less solid fact. 

"Hmm. Yes. Madman, as in 'lunatic'; from the Old French _lunatique_ , in turn heralding from Late Latin, _lunaticus_ , meaning moonstruck. Yes, a popular theory, especially given the etymology, but one ultimately without factual basis. The moon is just the moon, and lunar cycles – which I have well enough knowledge of," he said as an aside, "have no bearing on the character of a man. The moon controls the tides, and nothing more."

 

Gregson called on Holmes late that evening. The day had grown colder and bleaker, and a steady drizzle slicked the roads and pavement, and ran down the windows, obscuring the grey world outside. Holmes and Watson had wiled away the time with books and quiet kisses, and a spontaneous lecture on the practical methods of handling poisonous snakes while chasing villains.

When Mrs. Hudson called up to let them know of the Inspector's arrival, they were once more in front of the fire; Watson sunk deep into his arm chair, and Holmes stretched out on his back on the rug, smoking.

Holmes did not get up from the rug, but Watson stood to greet the Inspector warmly. Gregson was soaked to the bone, though the rain was still mild, indicating several hours spent outside. He was holding the leash of a wiry-haired terrier, with a long face and stumpy legs, who entered the room straining on the cord and growling. It snapped at Watson when he came closer, and howled once briefly, a hollow sound. Gregson yanked on the leash, astonished.

"I'm terribly sorry, doctor! Chaney's been out in the rain all day, like myself, perhaps he's just feeling restless. Here, down boy," he said, dragging the barking dog away. It was a tough fight, despite the small size of the dog, whatever had got him worked up had driven him wild, and he would not back down.

"Gregson, must you come in making such a racket," called Holmes form the floor. "I suppose this means you haven't found the housekeeper?"

Gregson stopped dead and nearly lost control of Chaney's leash. A great lurch and a tug brought him back to reality, and his face contorted in aggravation. "How did you –" Holmes quirked an eyebrow, looking at him upside down. "Well, no, we haven't," Gregson said, tightly. 

Holmes looked smug. "And the hound you borrowed from Brumford is a sight more rambunctious than Toby; you really should hone your instincts, Inspector, knowing a good hound from a bad one is an important distinction that could make or break the case."

Gregson appeared about ready to let the hound loose on Holmes, an affronted red flush creeping up his cheeks. "Yes, thank you, Mr. Holmes, for your very helpful and informative advice," he said. 

"You're very welcome," returned Holmes, cheerfully.

Watson offered Gregson a consolatory look, of the kind he was most used to giving to hapless police on the brunt end of Holmes' ire and mockery. Gregson rolled his eyes and seemed to be preparing himself to drag the still growling dog back out into the rain, when Holmes spoke up again.

"The housekeeper has family in Brighton, if you're interested in pursuing that line of thought. She's kept it well hidden, but I believe it's mostly likely that her lover has taken the jewels via the Underground, and not by carriage, which is why the good hound Chaney has found himself out of luck on this muddy day. Followed the trail to Regent's Park, didn't you?"

Inspector Gregson beamed, the earlier resentment forgotten. "Thank you very much, Mr. Holmes. I'm sure that with your aid, we will bring this case to a satisfactory close indeed."

He bundled up the dog and hurried out the door, calling over his shoulder a good-night to Watson and Mrs. Hudson.

"Indeed," said Holmes, as the door slammed.

"Quite the excitable dog, wasn't it?" asked Watson, closing the sitting room door and returning with a sigh of comfort to his arm chair. "Rambunctious."

"Not usually," Holmes murmured, lifting his head finally. "Chaney has been one of Brumford's more subdued dogs the many times I've seen him. A good hunter, with a good nose. Can't imagine what got into him."

"So you only said that to rile Gregson, then?"

"I have no idea what you are talking about."

Watson hummed, and stretched his legs out to put his slippered feet against the warm curve of Holmes' ribs. Holmes dropped his hand to one foot, and pushed up the hem of Watson's trousers, scratching cool fingers over fine hairs and the curves of his ankle.

 

The next morning Sherlock Holmes ate breakfast alone, although eating was farthest from his mind. He consumed, with the barest of attention, three consecutive cups of hot, black coffee, and half a piece of toast.

Holmes – being a lazy man, and usually late to breakfast save when he had been awake the entirety of the night – looked up from his treatise on the life cycles of the Ocypus olens, with a frown when Watson failed to make an appearance nearly three quarters oh an hour past his usual breakfasting time. Impatience and curiosity got the better of him, and he crept up the stairs silently, ignoring propriety and the standing accord to keep to their separate spaces unless mutually agreed.

John Watson was indeed still in bed, though not sleeping. Holmes had a momentary shock of panic; the sight which greeted him was not that which he expected, but one that seemed all too familiar. Watson was tangled, writhing and sweating, in his bedclothes, horribly reminiscent of his recent illness. The moment passed however, when Watson rolled over and fixed his attention upon Holmes in the doorway. 

His eyes were bright like a fever, but sharply conscious.

"Holmes," Watson whispered, voice roughened as though he had just woken up. The sound was coupled with an undertone of rumbling hunger and Holmes felt lust abruptly ignite in his veins.

"Still abed at this hour? You should be ashamed of yourself, dear boy. Whatever is the matter?" asked Holmes, slipping into the room and shutting the door behind him with a single glance behind to determine again that Mrs. Hudson was nowhere to be seen.

"Come here, Holmes," said Watson thickly, with a raised hand and a beckoning gesture.

Holmes laid his fingers against Watson's flushed, sweaty skin, felt his pulse thumping far too fast high in his throat. 

"Good Lord, Watson – you're burning up!"

He would have stopped for concern, but his hand was caught up in a hot, iron grip, and with no effort at all, Watson dragged him down and across the bed. Watson followed and pinned him expertly, straddling Holmes' hips with strong thighs, bare underneath his nightshirt.

Strong hands caught narrow wrists and pressed; Holmes sprawled supine over the bedclothes, breathless.

"I feel perfectly fine, Holmes," said Watson, demonstrating definitively that physical weakness was not a symptom of his current ailment. He bent, nosing along the curve of Holmes' jaw, along the sharp lines of his face, biting. It was too light to make significant mark, but a thrill of terror plucked at Holmes' mind regardless.

"Watson, not so high! Be mindful, dear boy," he cried, arching away and baring a thin sliver of his throat over the edge of his collar. 

Watson growled, making Holmes laugh, astonished, and followed his advice, pushing aside the fabric and fixing his teeth into the meat of Holmes' shoulder.

Holmes shouted. The pain was an unexpected addition to their usual relations, but nevertheless something he had always thought Watson capable of, if he was ever to let go of the tight reins of self-control. A moan caught in his throat, a tingle of fear crept up his spine, and instinctively he moved to break away from the pinning grasp. He had no real interest in pulling away from Watson's hungry, hot mouth. It was a primitive instinct overriding logical thought, but even so he could not pull away; Watson's grip was simply too strong.

The movement brought Watson to attention. He sat up, braced above Holmes' hips, and loosened the clench of his fingers to begin work on removing the layers of cloth between them. He stripped Holmes with practical, skilled fingers and strong familiarity, though he made no effort to remove his own clothing.

Without the downward force Holmes felt adrift for a brief, tempestuous pause. He moved where Watson moved him, and returned kisses when Watson kissed him, and he could not seem to catch his breath. 

"Are you here with me, Holmes?" Watson asked, eyes shining bright and intensely focused on Holmes' face, roving over the lines as he did always; as though imprinting them upon his memory, as though each time a new facet was discovered it was to be claimed and kept.

"Always," said Holmes.

Watson smiled. There was a glimpse of teeth beneath his moustache, and a touch of ferocity about the expression. "Good," he said. He kissed Holmes again, and laid upon him a multitude of hot promises that Holmes was eager to receive. 

Holmes groaned and his hips rose, his prick sliding against the inner curve of Watson's thigh beneath the cover of his nightshirt; no physical barrier at all, simply a visual blind that made Holmes weak to look upon, draped as it was across his stomach.

Watson made it his mission to drive Holmes to madness. His hands he tangled in Holmes' hair, drawing his head back, that Watson might bury his nose in the soft skin behind his ear and bite. His hips worked in shallow, rocking thrusts, pressing their groins together until their skin was hot and slippery and each push made Holmes shudder and gasp. 

With his whole being Watson took, finding new places to bite and kiss and raise hot red welts on all the tenderest spots of Holmes' skin, staking out his territory with teethmarks and fingerprints.

Holmes felt as though he was consumed entirely, and he quaked and panted to completion, inarticulate and frantic. Watson pulled away only enough to watch Holmes' face as he peaked, and bared his teeth in delight.

It took minutes, days, for Holmes to catch his breath, helpless to do anything but hold on as Watson rutted against the crease of his hip, moving endlessly and panting harshly, barely holding his weight braced. Watson fastened his teeth into a favourite point in the muscle of Holmes' chest as he unraveled. 

The pain grounded Holmes' slipping consciousness. He regained enough control to slide his hands up the back of Watson's nightshirt, digging his fingers into the rhythmic, clenching muscles beneath warm, sweaty skin. 

A strangled moan marked Watson's peak and finish. He came down panting, shivering, and Holmes used what coordination he had to guide Watson's sweaty brow to his shoulder, pulling him close and holding tight and whispering nonsense into his ear. 

Watson was still, almost frozen, for a long moment, and then sprang into motion with unexpected energy, rising from the bed and darting to his nightstand to attend his toilet.

"So, what did you wake me for, Holmes?" he called.

"Ah. Hmm. Nothing in particular."

"Oh? Very well; is there still breakfast? I'm positively ravenous." Watson had thrown on his clothes with haphazard attention paid, and was now struggling to complete the picture without beginning over again, adjusting the crumpled lines of his shirtsleeves. Holmes plucked vaguely at the bedclothes, and found his trousers and small clothes after a few blind grabs.

"Indeed? I myself could possibly use another bite of nourishment," intoned Holmes, feeling utterly wrung out. He dragged himself back into a semblance of a gentleman, and followed Watson back into the sitting room, where Mrs. Hudson had not yet tidied up from breakfast; still it stood, growing ever colder as the morning continued to progress ineffably.

Not ten minutes had passed before the bell rang, and Mrs. Hudson brought up a telegram for Holmes. She raised a silent eyebrow at the doctor eating the cold sausages and beans with unfeigned enthusiasm, but exited in the manner of her arrival all the same.

Watson read the telegram at Holmes' prompting. A call to the scene of a brutal murder from Inspector Lestrade, they have already arrested a suspect, but the wife claims an alibi. "They must be in competition again," remarked Watson, "A new promotion, perhaps?"

"Oh surely," said Holmes, lighting his pipe. He took a few contemplative pulls and scowled a the mantlepiece. "Well! How about it, then, dear chap? Interested in a crime of passion! Circumstantial evidence is the ruin of even the noblest of policeman; we must indeed do our best to save Lestrade from his own ego!"

Watson laughed,but shook his head regardless. "I have my own agenda today, Holmes," he protested. "I am meeting with two new clients and one who is a decorated veteran; I cannot abandon them, today of all days. Not even for a murder in Lambeth. Tell me all about it when you return, I will be delighted to hear how you shall solve the case."

Despite his amiable speech, when Holmes made to leave Watson stood abruptly and, without a care for spying eyes, caught him by the wrist and pulled him close. He kissed Holmes in a show that rivalled their earlier indiscretions, hollowing him out with lips and tongue, thick fingers wound in his hair to tilt his head for the perfect angle to touch Holmes' very heart.

"I shall see you tonight," he muttered against Holmes' lips.

"Quite so." Another, shorter kiss followed, then more, until it was an effort to drag themselves apart, that they might go about their separate ways.

 

Holmes did not, in fact, return to Baker Street that night. The clouds of the previous day had thinned to sparse, diaphanous things that dragged across the sky like cobwebs. Each attempted to snare the moon, though none could find purchase, and the moon broke free each time to cast light on London's eternal waking.

But Holmes saw none of this, locked away in the manor house of Mr. Vincent Knapp, Lestrade's suspect of choice. Between the victim, Mr. Thomas Klein, and Mr. Knapp was apparently a violent, bloody conflict, a long-standing disagreement, and a triangle of jealousy for Mrs. Stephanie Knapp. Absent from the scene was murder weapon or opportunity, for while Mr. Knapp had ample motivation for the crime, he had spent the night in question at the centre of a dinner party, and was within eyesight of one guest or another for the entirety.

All the guests had to be questioned properly, the crime scene investigated, and the policemen to be fended off from trampling the evidence beneath their boots. 

In the end, it was Mr. Knapp's hot-blooded nephew who had killed his uncle's would-be-nemesis. An ugly insult and a firing of tempers was the only cause, and at the heart of it a deep-seated twisted animal instinct. Klein had threatened Knapp to Knapp's nephew, and the nephew, a young man barely 20, and virile at the best of times, had taken it as personal offence. He'd killed the man with a cooking knife, and returned the piece to the kitchen just as dinner was being tidied, then remained to assure the blade was cleaned and lost in the influx.

Holmes made his way home by cab as the sun alighted on London's spires. Watson was awake and in the sitting room when he returned.

"Hallo, my boy!" called Holmes, flinging his overcoat off. He left it in a pile on the floor. "And what a night I've had. Lestrade was quite off on the wrong track for the majority of the evening, and his men – my word, whatever is the matter?" 

Watson looked up. He was pale. There was no need for detection to see the man was disturbed. His cheeks glistened with a cold sweat, and his eyes were hollow with a sleepless night.

"Watson?"

"Nothing, Holmes," he said, a feigned joviality in his voice that made Holmes cringe to hear. "Just a nightmare, though it gave me quite a start." He laughed.

"My dear boy. You look terrible."

Watson flinched away from Holmes' hand and stood abruptly, pacing from the table to the fire and back in short, jerky strides.

"No, no. How was the case? The night? You said Lestrade –"

"Watson." Holmes' voice was firm and demanding.

Watson stopped with his back to Holmes. It did not keep Holmes from seeing his expression in the mirror. His face crumpled in despair for just a brief flash, soul-deep, horrible to see despair, before he caught himself. He met Holmes' eyes in the glass.

"Holmes," he said, in a tone that pulled Holmes' heart from his chest. He did not say please, and did not need to as even a child could read the desperation in his eyes.

"I – Yes. Lestrade arrested the gentleman of the house, without much a care for the evidence in front of his nose." 

Holmes told the story, stilted at first. As Watson slowly relaxed out of whatever was eating away at him, Holmes made the effort to become more involved, until he finally managed to get a smile out of Watson, closely followed by a cry of delight at the cleverness of Sherlock Holmes.

It was enough for the time being. If Watson did not divulge then Holmes would find it out eventually. Still, the disquiet hung heavy in the air. 

Near lunch, Watson announced he was retiring briefly, as his sleep was disturbed and he wished for a moment of privacy. He rose from his chair, and stood stiffly, staring out the sitting room toward the steps to the floor above.

"John?"

"Yes. Just an little while," Watson offered vacantly, answering one unasked question, but not the most important one, the one Holmes wished to god he would answer.

"Very good, old boy."

Watson ascended the steps as though in a dream, and behind him from the sitting room, he heard the strands of sweet violin music. It wasn't one he recognized, but it lilted and carried itself like a lark, and with it the familiar strains of Sherlock Holmes at its heart. 

He unlocked the door at the top of the stairs and cringed going inside. His room had not changed since he'd left it that morning, though he had fervently wished it had been a dream upon waking. 

His bed had been torn to shreds and thrown about violently, ticking and feathers covering the surfaces of his desk and nightstand; small scraps of cloth littered the floor. The wardrobe was smashed to pieces, many of his clothes rent, other simply lost and buried among the debris. The small window overlooking the back garden was broken as though a rock had gone directly through the glass, or something of that nature. The door to the room itself was deeply gouged and splintered.

Watson had woken with the rising sun on the floor of his room amidst the ruins of his possessions, a horrible pain between his eyes, and an intense hunger aching in his belly. He'd pulled on his dressing gown and stumbled out onto the stairs, shouting for Mrs Hudson. The house had been empty and dead silent under his harsh breaths and pounding heart.

He had been on the landing, mind blank, for minutes before Mrs. Hudson met him on the stairs. 

"Doctor Watson?" asked Mrs Hudson, attempting to catch his attention. Used as she was so the eccentricities of her lodgers, it was not often that the respectable doctor wound up barely dressed and mindless of propriety on the ground floor.

Watson looked up and blinked, as though dazed. 

"Mrs Hudson. Yes. You weren't here when I called."

"No," said Mrs Hudson, growing affronted. "I was not here for you to call. Because I was not here at all."

Watson's gaze sharpened abruptly. "At all? You were not here last night – all night?" he asked, violent urgency colouring his voice.

"No, Doctor, not past sundown" said Mrs Hudson. "I told you last night, I'd gone to visit my sister. Are you quite well, Doctor?"

"So, you failed to hear – anything," murmured Watson, almost exclusively to himself, for the comment seemed barely directed at Mrs Hudson and it was only their proximity that allowed her to discern his words. 

She turned a careful eye over Watson, attempting to determine the cause of the doctor's distress. "I heard nothing from this house last night, Doctor," she said, and could not tell whether this was a comfort to him or a betrayal, for neither option seemed to be pleasing to him.

Watson said nothing. He clenched his eyes shut and scrubbed his knuckles into the tender points of his temples with a grimace. 

"Shall I bring up your breakfast, doctor? Will Mr Holmes be joining you this morning?"

"Ah – yes. Bring breakfast. I will –" he made a halting gesture up the stairs behind him, and began moving before finishing his sentence, turning his back on her and shuffling dejectedly up the stairs to his second floor landing.

His clothes he had to salvage from the piles of debris, but they were intact. His toilet took longer to attend, for the shaving mirror he used had been smashed along with the rest of his articles, and his shirt irretrievably crumpled. Long red welts ran up and down the lengths of his arms, he saw, as he dressed. They were not lacerations, but they did ache, and the skin felt tight like newly healed scars.

The bite mark on his forearm burned and throbbed beneath the bandage, still intact, despite the wreckage around him, but it was spotted brown with dried blood beneath the outer layers.

From there, he had left the wreckage of his room, and had sat, not eating at the breakfast table until Holmes had come home, trying to remember what had happened the night before.

He went back down the steps to the sitting room. An errand boy stood by Holmes, who was reading a telegram with a deathly solemn frown on his face.

Holmes glanced up when Watson entered. "From Lestrade; the man may not ever sleep, though you'd think that would make him slightly more knowledgeable about crime, if he spent all his waking hours and then some on the pursuits of information gathering," he said, gesturing with the telegram. He stood and stretched extravagantly, arms raised high over his head and his long back cracking. "Fetch your revolver, dear boy. The hounds are back! Another man mutilated; killed by savage dogs in the savage night. I still believe there is a pattern between these brutal killings; tonight we will find the culprit, the one who is at the heart of these attacks, and bring him to justice as he well deserves." He grinned suddenly. "If we make a days work of it, we should be back in time to see your full moon in all its glory."


	2. Chapter 2

_"Fighting against superstition is as hard as fighting against Satan himself."_

\- The Wolf Man (1941)

* * *

"This man is the first apparent link between the victims," announced Holmes, peering closely at the fingertips of the tragic figure. Inspector Lestrade was loath to come too near the body for the ripe, meaty smell that overlaid the usual London stench. 

"How do you know?" Watson asked. He was crouched at Holmes' side, squinting as if it would help him apply the same methods of Holmes' deductions to the hand, but he could see none of the indicators of connection that Holmes claimed were present.

"Do you see that mark, just there at the base of his thumb?"

Holmes indicated the area he specified and Watson spotted the thin white lines across the palm. 

"Is that a birthmark? How is this the connection?"

"I saw a similar mark, or part of one, on the third victim; the last night of the previous attacks. And if it is a birthmark, it's rather an unusual one." Holmes rotated the hand fully, and Watson cried out in surprise. "Yes, I thought so too. A pentagram is not the usual form a birthmark takes. It is not a scar though, see how the edges are not raised in any way? Nor are they ink or chalk, as even," he licked his thumb and rubbed it against the markings, "here, see how they do not smudge?"

"Why did you not see this earlier?" Lestrade demanded, from where he stood several feet away, still listening intently.

"Consider this, good Lestrade! The first two victims, Mr Carter and Miss Garrett, were attacked and killed alone, in the darkest corners of the night. No witnesses during the times of their deaths, only before or after. This is unlike the final victim of the previous period, Mr Lawrence, whom as we all know, was not alone at the time of the attack," said Holmes, nodding towards Watson and his own wound. 

"Both of the first victims had severe defensive wounds on their arms and hands – this from attempting to keep the dog away alone, like so," he demonstrated, assuming a cowering pose with his arms stretched in front of him, protecting his face, palms turned outward. "These circumstances lent themselves to significant gouges, bruising, and lacerations upon the hands, wrists, and arms. The marks were completely disfigured, hidden by the blood. Mr Lawrence on the other hand, had a momentary reprieve; the police force was out in full that third night, and the good doctor and myself were in attendance as well. Upon hearing the shouts and commotion, Doctor Watson rushed in to help; Lawrence dropped his arms, leaving him vulnerable; consequently, the dog could go straight for the jugular." He gestured to the newest victim once again. "This man has no defensive marks on his hands at all. Thus, we look for a reason why; luckily, we need not look far."

Holmes rolled the body over, placing the dead man on his front, and peeled away the collar from the back of the neck, revealing the marks of massive jaws and sharp teeth.

"The dog attacked from behind. See the paw prints here," he lifted up the coat and shirt; there were claw marks and dark bruises on the pale skin of the victim's back. "Just so. No defensive wounds: the mauling largely happened after the killing blow. All silent, as well. Did you hear anything last night, Watson?"

Watson stopped cold. "No. I heard nothing."

"There you have it. Inspector Lestrade, do you know who this man is yet? All I can see is that he was once well-off, though has recently fallen on difficult financial times; has lived in the country for several years, is an enthusiastic rugby player, and is rather wont to binge drink, but not on a regular basis. This scar on his forehead must be a grand story indeed; look at its jagged edge. But so faded, probably he received it as a youth."

"However you've learned all of that, I have no idea, but you may find someone available to confirm any of your suspicions. I do indeed know this man. I even recognized him myself, though I'd only seen him the one time. At the last funeral. This is Mr Claude Talbot; he was John Lawrence's god-son."

"His god-son! By Jove, we have a case! And then there's this." Holmes indicated to Watson to look closer at the wound on the neck; there was something stuck inside the wound.

Watson peered at it intently, and then closer for he could not believe his eyes. "Is that a tooth?"

"Well observed, Watson. Inspector, do you have a pair of tweezers?"

Lestrade called for a constable, who arrived carrying a small tool kit. Watson pulled the object from the wound with careful precision.

"It's a human tooth. Young adult male, perhaps. The canine, from the left upper mandible."

"Fantastic," cried Holmes, admiringly, slapping the ground beside the corpse with enthusiasm. He stood and wiped his hands off on his handkerchief.

"So, these are definitively murders, aren't they?" asked Watson, disturbed at the notion of murder carried out through such vicious tools. "But why these people? And what does the pentagram mean?"

"Indeed. And whose tooth is this?" Holmes studied it with blazing intensity. "I believe with this new connection we do have a case for murder, yet until we find out that final piece – the significance of the pentagram – we cannot say for sure the methodology behind the killings. I have a feeling... no. I will say no more. Come, Watson! We have work to do."

 

Watson begged off the hunt, claiming the cold and the wet were grieving him terribly. This was true in fact: both his old war wound and the bite mark ached to distraction, but it was not his primary motive for escaping Holmes' watchful eye.

Watson returned to Baker Street to find Mrs Hudson absent, and the flat dark and quiet. He ventured briefly, hesitantly, into the kitchen to find a broom and dustpan, and the moveable receptacle for trash and rubbish, and hauled the lot up the steps to the second floor. He removed his coat and cane in the hall outside his room, and took to cleaning up the mess from the morning with his shirtsleeves rolled to the elbow. 

The clothes he shook out and separated into two piles; one to keep, the other rent and ripped. The papers from his small desk were merely notes; the more important files he kept in the sitting room at his larger writing desk, but still he mourned the shredded stories as he stacked and brushed flakes of paper into the bin. 

The wardrobe door itself was smashed, the floor littered with splinters and tiny glittering shards of glass. The feathers from the mattress had settled over every horizontal surface. Watson swept and sweated, cleaning until his back ached and his arms were tired, and the whole venture was no more explained than when he had awoken. 

He dragged the full receptacle down the stairs one laborious step at a time, and for lack of a better option returned it to where he had found it, in the kitchen near the kitchen door. Hopefully the maid would not be too curious when she left it for the collectors. 

His room looked barren when he returned, attempting to recreate some semblance of normality, and as unfamiliar as when he'd just moved in, fresh from Afghanistan and taking a chance on a brilliant, bizarre stranger.

"Good God, Watson. What the hell happened?"

"Holmes!" Watson spun around to find Holmes, still wearing his greatcoat, frozen in the doorway. He hadn't even removed his hat or gloves.

"You weren't downstairs," said Holmes, sharp eyes taking in the entire horrible scene. Watson stepped toward him as though it could block Holmes' sight, his mind, his clever deductions. "I've found the rest of the connections between the victims." He spoke in an offhand way, side-stepping around Watson to see the whole of the room and all it lacked. "What happened, John?"

A deep, heavy resignation sank into Watson's heart. He could not lie to Holmes; or at least, he could not tell a lie that Holmes would believe for an instant. Downsizing, moving out; none of them would rationalize the absurdity of the scenario. He scrubbed his hands violently over his face, then turned away from Holmes, his shoulders slumping. "I don't know, Holmes."

"Are you alright? Was there a robbery?" Holmes' face said he already knew the answer to that.

"No, no robbery. I was just... I woke up, and... Holmes, please, I don't understand what's happening."

"Come away from this room," insisted Holmes, dragging Watson out and down the steps, making him stumble from the force of his grip and the urgency of his steps. 

It was much later than Watson had supposed; the sitting room was nearly dark and the sun shone high on the buildings opposite, shadows long amidst the red glow of evening. Holmes pulled his gloves and hat off, throwing them down upon his desk and shucked his overcoat in a grand and sweeping gesture that ended with the coat on the floor and Holmes already striding across the room to light the fire in the grate. His moves had not their usual grace and fluidity as he tugged one armchair closer to the hearth, but a awkwardness that spoke of agitation and discomfort.

"Sit here."

Watson sat.

Holmes perched himself upon a footstool inches from Watson's knees. The fire cast harsh shadows across his noble features, making him look strange, animalistic, and feral, but his eyes carried the familiar gleam of concern and intelligence that always reassured Watson, even in the most dangerous of cases. 

"Now. Tell me whatever you can."

Watson growled in the back of his throat. "I can't! I can tell you nothing, Holmes!"

"Yes, dear boy, you can! I know this because you did not find your room in such a state of bereavement. If you had, you would not be sweating, there would not be a trail of debris and dust down the steps, your hands would not be so splintered and battered. The bin in the kitchen is full to the brim of clothes and glass, and these are from your room; I recognized the photograph of your friend Murray, the fabric of your jacket. Now _what_ happened last night? This is what had you so disquiet this morning, was it not?"

"It was," said Watson in a low tone. Inexplicable anger roiled in his chest, squeezing. He took a long breath, and then another one, and though they did not calm the tight bands around his heart he regained some sense in his head. "Yes, Holmes you are right, of course, but please believe me when I say I cannot tell you anything. I regret to say this aloud, for it seems just a fevered dream but... I can remember nothing about last night. Nothing at all."

Holmes pounded his fist into the padded arm of the chair, making Watson jump, and swore violently.

"If you had not cleaned I could have told you! I could have found the very answers you were looking for; do you not trust me, John? Did you not believe I would help you in this, however I could?" At once Watson recognized the betrayal in Holmes' eyes.

"Oh, Sherlock, of course I do!" he cried. He stood abruptly, shaking Holmes' hands from his knees and began to pace. "I – panicked. I woke to my room destroyed, and there was no one else in with me. The door was shut and marked from the inside, the cabinets smashed, and glass cracked, my mattress ripped and scattered!" He stopped, breathing heavily, and then he swayed; he could not catch his breath and the world seemed to be spinning out of his control.

Holmes leapt to his feet and caught the doctor before he fainted.

"If I thought you would not believe me, it is only because I do not believe it myself. I swear. Sherlock," he clutched helplessly at Holmes' arms, "I cannot remember going upstairs last night, let alone what happened in the late hours."

"Dear boy. My dear Watson. Come, sit down again, I won't have you knocking your head against the desk." Holmes led Watson more gently to the armchair. "I'll ring down for some tea. Mrs Hudson should still be up and about. Just one moment."

The sitting room was quiet without Holmes. Watson let himself sink into the cushions, closing his eyes and letting the vague horror of the day seep out of him. Holmes on the case was a sign that results would follow; it was always so. He was not alone, nor had he ever been, though he felt ashamed how he had forgotten that in the state of mindless panic. He regretted his earlier curtness, his refusal to let Holmes in.

Holmes reentered with a tea tray; he set the tray on the edge of the writing desk and offered Watson a cup.

Watson sipped gratefully, and then said delicately, "Holmes, is Mrs Hudson still up?"

"No, Watson. She has gone away again, back to her sisters. Apparently she has better things to do this night than care for the needs of her lodgers," said Holmes, fixing his own cup of tea.

"You made this yourself?"

Holmes beamed, ever so pleased with himself, and took a sip. He let it dribble out of his mouth again, without a single change in his expression. "Ah."

Watson set his cup down with even more relish than he had picked it up, and laughed. "Come here; no, leave the tea."

When Holmes stood before the armchair, Watson took up his hands and pulled him down to meet him in a kiss. "Thank you, old boy. I cannot say how much you mean to me."

"Not a word more about it. You will rest tonight," encouraged Holmes, "and we shall turn our minds, refreshed and new, to this problem in the morning." He untangled his hands from Watson's and cupped his face, long fingers smoothing over crinkled brows. "All will be well, and all manner of things will be well." Holmes pressed his mouth to Watson's forehead, and once to the corner of his eye, then settled himself perched on the arm of the chair. 

"Will you tell me more of the case? You must have discovered something."

"Ah-ha! Indeed I have. It has made itself clear to me, the circumstances of these horrendous crimes, save, remarkably, the involvement of the dog. That is the only piece that I still have doubts about. But I digress. What I have discovered, which we did not know before, is that _all_ of the victims in these attacks were in fact connected." 

As he spoke, he drew his fingers through Watson's hair, enticing him to close his eyes against the firelight, and concentrate all his focus upon the story. "The first and the latest – Mr Alistair Carter and Mr Claude Talbot – were old school friends, once very close though they have had no contact these last twenty years or so. Miss Heather Garrett has been engaged to Mr Talbot, or promised to at least, for the same amount of time, though there have never been preparations for an actual commitment to the marriage; yet her family rejects the notion, so they made no claims save to mourn her death. And John Lawrence, the third victim, as we know was Mr Talbot's god-father and guardian. Thus, the threads that bind these characters together. I made my way to the home of Mr Lawrence to speak with his household staff, only to learn that he had the barest minimum, despite having a reputation for long-standing wealth."

Watson squirmed as Holmes' fingers crept down the outer rim of his ear and down his neck to trace filigree patterns over the skin of his throat, soothing and repetitive. Holmes continued his tale with a smile audible in his voice.

"The maid, remarkably stone-faced, told me that both Lawrence and Talbot resided at the house, largely destitute, and that neither of them was well missed. Lawrence had a gambling problem, you see, but Talbot had a reputation to cover for; they lied about their debts as Lawrence spent all the family money. This also goes to reason why Miss Garrett and Mr Talbot never married, despite several years in purgatory. From there, I followed the story of the falling out – what made Carter and Talbot break so many years ago, and why should it come back to haunt them now? For there was no other reason for Mr Carter to be involved at all; he has lived a clean and prosperous life as an estate sales man for several years, married with a child. Approximately as without sin as you or I," he said with a smirk, and a decidedly sinful creep of his fingers into Watson's shirtfront.

"Further digging provided this too," he continued. "A voyage to the continent upon Miss Garrett's debut; once again twenty years before, and of course the men were still in contact at that time. Thus, the critical moment in this case! Although I cannot yet discern the particulars, I feel I understand the heart of the matter all too well: some betrayal, so deep and harmful that twenty years later, it still has its marks to leave. Their records mention a trip to the Black Forest in the Kingdom of Württemberg, of the southern German states; I now await a response from the Stuttgart police force. My hope is that they will have some record of the incident, or at the very least someone who remembers it."

"So we just await the morning, then?" asked Watson, face turned into Holmes' wrist, holding him close.

"The morning," murmured Holmes, slipping off the arm rest, throwing his leg over and settling astride Watson's lap. "Think of nothing else tonight but me."

He bent Watson's head back to bite at his bare neck while his fiddling hands worked away at buttons and cloth. "Did you know that I have a bruise on my shoulder, just out of eyesight, that perfectly matches the marks of your teeth? I know, because Constable James – that villain with no sense of propriety – has been slapping me about that same shoulder all day. I find I have the urge to return the favour," he said. He gnawed a tiny bit harder and Watson groaned aloud. 

"I did not mean to, Holmes," Watson protested. He grasped at Holmes' hips and tugged him in tight; sought the seams of Holmes' trousers and dug in with short fingernails. The fabric pulled taught over Holmes' cock and he gasped.

"At which point did you hear me say I disliked it?" asked Holmes snidely and a little breathlessly, focusing in on Watson's chest and the tan contours of his collarbone. His bites held none of the ravishing that his words had promised, just little red marks and a bright pain that tantalized as it taunted.

Watson did not notice Holmes' fingers pause over the pale welts on his arms, for he did so briefly and without stopping the shallow rocking of his hips. Either way, Watson was much too busy uncoordinatedly stripping Holmes of his waistcoat and shirt until they were both bare-chested and panting in the firelight. 

They met again in a kiss, and another one, and these were deep and hungry and hot. Watson took over the engagement, dragging Holmes off balance and encouraging him to submit with tongue and teeth, until Holmes made needy noises and could not still the movements of his hips. Holmes, clever with his hands as with his sharp tongue, found his way into the front of Watson's trousers, and gripped his prick in his warm palm.

Watson growled, and threw them both out of the chair to the floor, cushioning Holmes' head with his hands to his knuckled took the brunt of the force, that he might land on top. "Well if you say so, you wouldn't mine one or two more, would you?" he laughed into Holmes' mouth, and set hands back to busy work of unfastening his detective from all possible restraints. Holmes squirmed delightfully beneath him, a smirk curling his lips as though he was the one in control.

Watson bit Holmes' lip and it bled.

He felt a sharp pain in his belly.

Holmes recognized the difference between Watson's grunts; he pulled his hands away immediately, pressing them flat to the carpet on either side of his head. "Are you alright?" he asked, breathing heavily. His grey eyes were shining silver rims around deep black pools; dilated with increased blood flow, signs of arousal, but nothing would dim his sight. Watson was momentarily distracted, for it was a look he loved in his dear friend, but he was quickly brought back to the matter at hand. It felt like a hot needle pressing against his ribs.

"Ow," said Watson, in a very small voice.

"What's the matter?"

"It's nothing. Just – ah!" Watson flinched in a grand display of how poor timing could ruin a lie. 

"Let me up; let me check on you," Holmes insisted. He raised his hands to hold Watson's face, feeling for fever. "By Jove, man, you're burning up."

Watson found he was shivering, suddenly and violently, a feeling of great and terrible cold clenching down in his bones. He could not support his weight on his arms and collapsed, shaking, onto Holmes.

"Watson?" Holmes tried roll them over so Watson was on the floor where he could not harm himself, but he was heavy and shuddering and Holmes had to struggle to keep hold of him at all. He sat up finally; Watson slid into his lap, and began to scream.

"Ah, _fuck!_ " Watson cried, curling in on himself. "God, _it hurts._ " It felt like there was something squirming inside him; something huge, and with sharp teeth. The mark on his arm had reopened again and was oozing blood to stain the bandage in dark, wet patches.

Then he began to change.

Holmes threw himself across the floor, scuttling backward like a crab. He hit the wall head-first because he did not dare turn away and sat frozen in the darkness where the firelight did not touch, for the sun had fully set. He was glad Mrs Hudson was not about that night, for even if the shrieking did not wake her, the thumping and scraping at the floor, the hideous cracking surely would have.

He felt about him blindly, grasping for a weapon. One of Watson's sticks was within arms-reach, the heaviest one, of African snake-wood. He hefted it over his shoulder to use as a bludgeon.

The thing that had been John Watson began to growl.

Holmes did not dare to stand, lest he draw its attention. This was, he noted in a far corner of his mind, a useful thing to know; it explained the involvement of the dog rather nicely.

Although 'dog' was perhaps an inappropriate word to use. 'Wolf' seemed much more fitting, given the circumstances.

It growled again, and Holmes stopped breathing involuntarily, as though that might stop it from smelling him, finding him. He carried the stench of sweat and arousal, of mud and manure and the city, of hot blood and terrible tea; he could smell it himself. These the darkness would not cover.

The wolf was still shuddering. It had long and terrible claws and was several feet tall at the shoulder; it was not just large it was enormous, and whatever it was – for it could not possibly be a real wolf, there were no wolves in England – it had taken the place of John Watson entirely and there was nothing left of him.

Not even in its eyes, when it turned those yellow glowing orbs upon Holmes in his hiding place. That low, horrible rumbling snarl resonated through the room. 

Holmes moved his feet underneath him and slid slowly up the wall, bracing himself with the stick.

The wold leapt and Holmes began to run.

Barefoot and shirtless, barely wearing his trousers at all, down the stairs he ran and out the door, for if there was anywhere safe it would not be in the cramped quarters of Baker Street; any corner could become a death trap should the wolf break though a barrier or a door. It certainly appeared strong enough.

He could hear the scrabbling of claws on wood floors and the great thump of enormous paws thundering down behind him, and then he was in the street. It was not even 6 o'clock, for the days were growing shorter, though the dark and the cold had shunned most Londoners indoors for the evening, and the street was quiet. The rain from the day before lay in puddles between the cobblestones, and the air was cold and damp, the kind that seeped in to the core and refused to let go. Cold air twisted in Holmes' lungs at the first breath, but he could not stop to cough. 

Holmes ran for the park. He slipped on patches of water and shredded the tender skin of his feet on the harsh pavement, and still he ran.

There were residents in the houses on either side of the street, glowing yellow windows full of the promise of warmth and security, knowing nothing of what was out in the dark at that moment. The moon slipped behind a cloud and the street was suddenly dim. Even in London the full moon held its own against the city lights.

The wolf was behind him – he could hear it panting, though it ran quietly on the pavement, where it did not give beneath its weight – and then it was past him, and running out into the darkness of Regents' Park and lost into the night.

Holmes stumbled to a stop, the momentum of his run nearly throwing him to the ground.

From the darkness came a howl, deep and bloodcurdling, and so very alien. From the south, there was an answering cry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh fuck a case fic
> 
> this is why I don't write Holmes fics. they always turn into terrible mysteries and not nearly enough boning


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oops, now there's knotting. also this is completely out of control.
> 
> except actually the whole reason for this fic was the knotting, so really oops, there's exposition. _(whispers i'm so sorry)_

_"I believe a man lost in the mazes of his own mind may imagine that he's anything."_

\- The Wolf Man (1941)

* * *

"Inspector Lestrade, how very good to see you this fine morning! Quite the marvellous sunrise, and did you see the moon last night? It was indeed a wonder."

"Good morning, Mr Holmes." Lestrade was not in a particularly good mood at all, as a matter of fact, nor was he well practiced at hiding it; Holmes had perfected his mask years before, though rarely was he motivated to use it.

"Have you had a response from Stuttgart?"

Lestrade glared. For all that his work benefited from Holmes' involvement, the little man resented it with candour, even as he admired and appreciated Holmes himself and his wit. The conflict within Lestrade was perhaps enough to bring any man to drink, and having so refused such a vice, he was mostly just very irritable on a regular basis.

Holmes sat at the breakfast table alone, smoking steadily on his black clay pipe and ripping apart a scone into a mess of unrecognisable tiny crumbs. He had the newspaper before him, his feet up on the arm of a chair, and a stack of letters that he had not even bothered to fix to the mantle piece, ignored and stained with a dark ring of coffee. There had been no mention of a wild animal attack the previous night, aside from a brief note of residents hearing the sounds of dogs fighting in the streets.

If Lestrade was as observant as Holmes, he would see the disruption of the morning routine. But he was not, and so did not.

"We have had a response. This," he stepped aside with the dramatic flair he usually reserved specifically for Holmes, "is Nikolaus Müller; he was the officer involved with the 'incident' as he calls it, twenty years ago. Mr Müller, this is Mr Sherlock Holmes."

Müller was clearly a retired policeman, some sixty years of age, and well dressed in tailored clothes that, though worn, were of noticeably high quality and resilience. Although his eyes had a myopic squint to them, he did not wear glasses. He had a long pale face, white whiskers, and a barrel shaped chest above long thin legs that lent him a comical appearance, though his hawk-like nose and narrow blue eyes would deter any commoner from speaking of it. Müller bowed slightly and removed his hat but not his gloves.

"Herr Müller, I am pleased indeed to see you. Very good of you to catch the night train, though I dare say your cabbie is not a decent demonstration of all the welcoming charm that London has to offer. Please sit, and dry yourself off. Inspector, would you care for some breakfast? A cup of coffee?"

"No thank you Mr Holmes," said Lestrade. "Is Doctor Watson here? I would have thought he'd like to hear the end of this."

Holmes took a long drag off his pipe and did not blink. "He's out at the moment. We will surely catch up with him later."

Müller sat, and Lestrade hovered in the corner like a particularly obnoxious fly.

"Now, what can you tell me of this 'incident'?"

Müller cleared his throat. He had a worried look upon his face and a air of a man about to impart a secret. When he spoke, it was with an incredibly thick Swabian accent. Holmes briefly entertained the notion of continuing the conversation in German, which would certainly make the communication clearer, but there were sure to be some singular features about the tale that Lestrade needed to hear first hand, and so refrained.

"It was not in Schtugert, as you say Mr Holmes, but Calw, a town in the Nordschwalzwald, a little more than thirty kilometres outside Schtugert, where I live and worked. They did not have a police force, so I was the officer. It was... a horrible affair, Mr Holmes. It was the spring of '74, and the gentlemen and the lady had come for holiday. Two young men, one older; and the young lady." 

He spoke extremely slowly, as though he was deeply considering each of his words carefully, and the best way to tell the story – though he was not a natural storyteller. "The lady was quiet, I remember; a delicate thing and sweet, though somehow fragile, maybe broken. The young men were opposite; charming and smart, and not quiet – very nice, very handsome. The old man was – a chaperone, and not very friendly. The maids liked the young men; young Adelaide Weiß fell in love, perhaps with the man, or with the... adventure. They were strangers and Miss Weiß had never left Calw in her life."

Despite the twenty years between Müller and the incident he spoke of, his countenance took on an expression of distress as he spoke. "The young men; one was older –"

"Mr Talbot, I think we can say for sure," interjected Holmes. "Mr Carter was his junior by almost two years, and spend a great deal of his time looking up to the gregarious Mr Talbot."

"I will defer to your knowledge, Mr Holmes, for I never met them myself. I only came after."

"So you never solved the crime yourself?" Lestrade asked sharply. "How are we to know this isn't just speculation?"

"There was nothing to solve! It was clear as day, but they left, and we could not pursue them! Mr Holmes, when a young woman is ruined – she will not speak. Who is she to trust? Who is she to turn to who will not persecute her? But although we knew the crime and the criminals, if she did not pursue, we could not also."

He shook his white head slowly, like it was as heavy as the world, back and forth in an admission of dismay. 

"The older of the two; Mr Talbot? He favoured Adelaide Weiß while he was there. He was kind and thoughtful. Then they were to leave, and Adelaide Weiß asked to go with him. He laughed at her, as did his friend. They said Mr Talbot and the young lady were engaged; what would they do with a dirty maid? It broke the poor girl's heart, drove her to madness. She fought them, raised a clamour, but the older man stepped in and beat her with his cane. Nearly killed her, and her baby."

Holmes was silent.

"But they did survive?" he asked eventually.

"They did. Shunned, though; would almost have been better had she not. Adelaide Weiß moved to the edge of the town, nearest the border of the Schwarzwald, and did laundry for the townspeople. They would have none of her, for everyone knew the story."

"The feeble mind of the isolated community is a terrible thing, to be sure; one I have often had opportunity to put straight."

Müller nodded sadly. "I checked in on her from time to time. I made sure she was supported when she had no work. For a time she resented me. Five years after the incident, when her son began to ask questions, she told me to never return for I would make him wonder. She had grown thin and vicious with the years, aged before her time – she was only one-and-twenty, and faced with such hardship. Eventually she let me help again, but she never forgave me. Adelaide protected herself however she could. "

"And no wonder," murmured Holmes.

Then it was Müller's turn to sit in silence. His eyes darted back and forth and he began to sweat. The sad, contemplative man was gone, and in his place sat a man who did not expect to be believed.

"There is... a story," he said, and stopped. "In the Schwarzwald, there are many stories. This is..." He changed tracks abruptly. "Adelaide Weiß's son grew to be a strong young man. She named him Ulric."

"The Noble Leader?" asked Holmes. 

Müller shook his head and stared Holmes down with his piercing blue eyes. "The Ruler of Wolves," he said, in a deep voice.

Holmes dropped his pipe onto his dressing gown and fumbled to catch it before it sparked.

"Have you heard, Mr Holmes, of the legend of the werwolf?"

Lestrade burst out laughing. Sherlock Holmes silenced him with a glare and straightened in his seat. 

"The werewolf is a fantastical creature, first mentioned in Herodotus' _Histories_ , and the story of Lycaon, from the Greeks, depicting the transformation of a man into a wolf for some reason or another. During the fifteenth-century people were persecuted as werewolves in association with the witchcraft panic of the ages and the witch-hunts throughout Germany and France. Giles Garnier was accused, tried, and executed as a werewolf, for crimes of murder and cannibalism in 1573. The Beast of Gévaudan murdered upwards of eighty people between the years 1764 to 1767," recited Holmes. The 'W' volume of his encyclopaedias of crime was still open on the desk; he had been reading intently all morning. "Yes, I am familiar with the concept. A popular topic in the Gothic story, I find. Sensational literature."

"It may well be as you say," said Müller, looking a little started at the onslaught of information. "But in the Schwarzwald it is more than 'literature' as you call it. The towns are built on such stories. When Ulric grew old enough to start working, he took to the forest as a woodsman. He was strong and brave, and would go deeper than the other men. I saw him as he grew; he was tall and big and had dark, dark hair and darker eyes."

"Did the townspeople think he was a werewolf?" asked Lestrade with a sneer.

Müller denied the thought, to Holmes' surprise. "They thought he was a bastard, which was worse. No matter how hard he worked they would not respect him, and he saw the same of his mother. But then..." he hesitated again, before determining to continue, and ploughed on, speaking so quickly his words began to blur. "This last year was his twentieth birthday. He came to me in Schtugert, told me he knew me. He demanded the story of his father. I thought I owed him the truth." He hung his head in shame. "So I told him. He was so angry. I took a carriage after him to Calw, I found Miss Weiß in a panic. She hit me, said I had betrayed her and her son would leave her forever now. When I asked her where he had gone, she told me he had run into the forest."

"The townspeople had no respect for the boy; they would not join in the search. Between Adelaide Weiß and myself we could not cover the whole area of the woods. It was dark soon, and we returned defeated. All we could do was hope that Ulric would come out of the woods alive."

"And what happened?"

"A wolf came into town," said Müller. Misery was written on his long face. "It attacked so many people before they shot it dead with a silver-tipped arrow. They do not take chances. It killed seven people... one of them was Adelaide Weiß. Ulric came out of the woods not an hour later. When he saw his mother dead and I still with her, he looked at me with such hateful eyes. I knew something had changed. He left town shortly after; all this was just over two months ago. Now I am merely waiting my turn." 

With that he removed his gloves and showed Holmes the thin pale lines of a pentagram, etched across his left palm. 

Holmes cried aloud in surprise, and Lestrade leapt forward to see for himself.

"When I received the message from London I knew at once what he had done. Now I believe I am the final piece to end his vengeance. Three nights a month, the werewolf has to wreak his doom; tonight is the last." He looked down at the mark on his hand. "I cannot say I fear it. It feels long overdue. The whole mess will be over soon."

"Not as soon as you think," said Holmes sharply. "If he is indeed the one perpetrating these attacks, he has wrought more than simple vengeance. The wolf has inflicted a total of four nights of savagery upon London so far; upon the third – last month – he laid his teeth into an innocent bystander, one attempting through bravery and selflessness to save the life of one of your villains. How do you propose to handle that?"

Müller shot to his feet.

"He has passed it on?"

"And doomed a good man to a terrible fate."

"Then you must kill this man! No matter how he behaves in life, by the light of the moon he is a wolf, through and through, though empowered by a deadly force. The werewolf is driven to kill that which it loves the most. It is not a man, nor does it abide by mens morals. Ulric lost his mother, the only person he loved; but what he loved after that was his hatred. Now he has nothing. I do not know what he will do after he kills me."

"We will stop him from killing you!" declared Holmes. "And we will find a way to fix this."

Müller looked as though the conversation had aged him another twenty years. He blinked his cold blue eyes slowly, and Holmes was horrified to see them fill with tears. "There is no way to fix it."

He turned abruptly and fled, barely avoiding knocking into Lestrade. They stood in silence, listening to his footsteps thunder down the stairs, then the clack and rattle of a cab pulling away.

Lestrade broke the silence first with a hesitant cough. " _'Kill the thing it loves the most.'_ That would be you, wouldn't it, Mr Holmes?"

Holmes sat back in his chair and pressed his knuckles to his pursed lips, staring out into the middle distance. He did not respond.

"Where is Doctor Watson?" Lestrade asked quietly.

Holmes shook his head. "I don't know."

 

John Watson returned of his own volition, not an hour after Lestrade had left, taking the stairs two at a time and as quietly as possible, for he did not know if Holmes was awake or not, but he did not like to risk waking him.

He wore borrowed clothes and too-small shoes that pinched his feet, dirty and improper for a gentleman but all that had been available; these he began to strip from himself as soon as the door latched shut behind him. His abdomen hurt terribly and his arms ached with a fierce, sharp pain upon lifting the shirt over his head, nearly stopping him in his motions. 

"If I were to call the police, Doctor Watson, would it be more accurate to tell them that the blood is yours, or someone else's?" 

Watson leapt across the room with an exclamation of surprise at Holmes' sudden appearance behind him, knocking over his nightstand. It clattered noisily to the floor, loosing its contents, and Watson sighed heavily, hand on his chest to check the racing of his heart.

"I do wish you wouldn't startle me like that, Holmes."

"No? Then might I perhaps ask how you would like to be startled? By my own arrival back at our mutual lodgings, after being gone nearly an entire day and night, covered in dried blood and refusing to speak of it, as apparently you are wont to offer me?"

Watson snorted. "As if you have not done the same."

Holmes smiled thinly. "Be that as it may."

"It's mine, Holmes," said Watson in a low tone, without meeting Holmes' eyes. He turned his back, and made a show of folding up the filthy, borrowed shirt he had arrived in as though it was the finest quality.

"And yet, I see no wound,." Holmes came up behind Watson and put a hand to bare shoulder blades. "These? They look a week old at least."

The skin under the blood was the tender pink of new scars; long marks in rows of four, straight lines in stuttering patterns. They were nearly a match to the marks on Watson's forearms, but not quite.

Holmes' touch was cool and light as a feather; Watson shuddered under his caress and let his head fall back into an indulgent roll of his shoulders. Holmes slipped his palm down to the neat curve of his waist and Watson snatched his fingers up into a tight, unforgiving grip and squeezed until Holmes gasped aloud and twisted to relieve the pressure.

Watson released the hand and fell backward several paces, a look of horror crossing his face. Holmes flexed his hand and cracked his knuckles, watching the blood returned to the abused fingers.

"A thousand apologies," Watson whispered, face white and eyes large. "You should not touch me, I'm sorry. You do not understand what has happened to me."

Holmes stopped massaging his hand and looked at Watson sharply, his thin eyebrows raised. "Have you forgotten to whom you are speaking, Doctor? If I do not understand then it is merely a matter of time before I do. And, as it may or may not have escaped your notice, I have had great opportunity to observe you in all your states, so rest assured that it is exceedingly unlikely that you yourself understand this scenario better than I."

"Dammit, Holmes do _not_ condescend to me," snapped Watson, anger burning in his chest like a hot coal. "You may very well believe that your comprehension is beyond all measure, but this is so far outside your reasoning, your logical mind, that I cannot see. Please, for I know that I am very stupid; please inform me, Holmes: what can you _possibly_ understand?" He had an angry flush high in his cheeks; panting for breath, with his bare chest heaving, blood dried in streaks down his sides, and his eyes alive and blazing – he'd never seemed more bestial.

"What I understand is _this_." Holmes countered Watson's attempt to dodge him, moved in close and slapped his open palm down across the bite wound on Watson's forearm, uncovered and raw looking.

It stung horribly. Watson growled and shoved Holmes back; he tripped over the fallen nightstand and landed heavily on the bed in a sprawl. Holmes caught himself on his elbows, a stubborn glint to his narrow grey eyes, his pale face tinged red.

The indefinable hunger that had been lingering in the pit of Watson's insides for the last few days ignited in a rush. He closed his eyes in shame and turned his head away.

"You should leave, Holmes – get out and let me be. I'll be gone before sundown."

Holmes surged to a sitting position, braced on his hands, his legs spread the perfect amount for Watson to slip between them. "You will do no such thing. You are my dearest friend, my only confidant. I will not see you suffer through this alone – you must trust me as you have trusted me in the past. I am in this with you, my dear boy, do you not see that? Nothing you can do will ever turn me away so don't you dare turn away first." He narrowed his eyes in an accusatory glare in direct contradiction to the words he spoke. "If you really think that you can hurt me, then I should like to see you try."

"Do not tempt me," Watson pleaded, shaking his head in useless denial; no matter how he spoke, he did not move his gaze from the sight of Holmes upon his bed, as if prepared for a singular feast.

"Is it tempting?"

Watson looked devastated, unspeakably torn between the hunger and the horror. "More than I care to think. I would never hurt you, Sherlock, not in malice, never; but take my word that what I feel at this moment is anything but malice."

"And what would you do, my sweet fellow, if I gave you permission?" Holmes' words were barely a breath upon his lips, his eyes dark and full of fire.

"I would take all of you, and everything you have to give," confessed Watson. He stalked toward the bed and the space between Holmes' splayed knees. Holmes sitting was roughly the height of Watson's belt; he had to crane his neck to look him in the eyes.

Holmes laughed. "How very foolish you are, dear boy. Every time: you see, yet you fail to reason. Have you missed the most obvious fact, Watson? I am already yours." He extended his hand for Watson to take and lay back upon the bedclothes, drawing Watson down with him.

Watson took Holmes' mouth with a vengeance, kissing him deep and thorough, holding his head and mussing his smooth hair. Holmes returned with teeth and tongue, gripping Watson's shoulders to keep him close, pull him closer.

With Watson already half-undressed and Holmes having exercised a cavalier approach to decency that morning, they were rapidly stripped and naked against each other, thrusting and panting for breath.

It was only then that Holmes saw another, more physical, change in Watson; with the long bare stretches of hot skin pressed against his own. It was not wholly obvious, not to the eye at least, but with a hand on Watson's prick, Holmes felt a distinct difference he had not thought to look for previously; a slight thickening at the base of Watson's ruddy cock. Holmes squeezed it experimentally. Watson choked on his next breath and thrust helplessly, groaning low into the crease of Holmes' shoulder.

"John," Holmes panted. The air was hot and stuffy and not nearly as fulfilling as it should have been, for no matter how he breathed it in it would not stop the spinning in his head. " _Please._ "

The presence of mind Watson had to muster to find the oils he needed was a heroic effort. They were on the floor, having spilled from the overturned nightstand. He groped for them, blindly, and then with more effort, while Holmes pulled himself more fully onto the bed itself.

In turning, Watson was captivated by the display Holmes had made of himself; long and slender, milk pale and glistening with sweat. Watson made a deep rumbling noise in his chest and moved one hand to the underside of Holmes' knee, pushing up and out, opening him fully to his gaze. Sweet oils on his fingers, and a firm grasp on his muscled thigh, he worked into Holmes to the tune of his groans, tormenting him into breathless urgency. 

Watson, knowing the intimacies of Holmes' body and feeling the relaxation of his internal muscles, began to withdraw his hand. Holmes grabbed Watson's wrist to keep him close.

"Is this alright?" Watson asked, hesitating, his fingers stilled and his voice rasping.

"Keep going," said Holmes. He swallowed thickly. "I like it."

Watson obliged above and beyond, until Holmes was writhing, turned inside out and desperate for completion; open, loose, and indecent. Watson pulled himself free and leaned back, staring avidly at Holmes wantonly spread out before him. 

"You are magnificent," he said in a hoarse whisper, running his slippery fingers down the insides of Holmes' pale shivering thighs. He slipped them around Holmes' hips and tugged him across the bed, the sheets crumpling beneath Holmes' back. It was easy then to push inside, wet and yielding as he was; a long inexorable slide that had Holmes arching and sighing.

Holmes made a choked noise when Watson pressed flush against his hips, and scrabbled uselessly at his strong forearms holding him solidly down.

"You will be the _death_ of me," he said, irritated and squirming, when he'd caught his breath. "Move."

Watson grinned, showing his teeth, and obeyed the letter of the order: in shallow, rocking thrusts. He put one hand on Holmes' groin and pressed, so the rocking and the pressure met in the middle and Holmes cried out, hips rolling to meet the pleasure as best he could given his limited range of motion. 

Watson's hands, having fixed Holmes into position, began to rove, trailing fire across Holmes' chest and sides; tweaking his nipples into hard nubs, pinching the tender flesh of his thighs and sparking tiny blips of pain that meshed with the pleasure that had taken him wholly into an overpowering cacophony of sensation.

Watson fucked him slowly, with long, steady strokes that pressed inside Holmes with perfect accuracy, for as long as he could stand. Holmes, never stoic in his enjoyment of the physical pleasures, exclaimed aloud feeling of the swollen base of Watson's prick pushing into him, stretching him wide and achingly open. Taken by animal instinct, Watson hooked one arm underneath Holmes' knee and leaned in, folding him nearly in half and shoved with his hips until the knot breeched and Holmes fell to short, gasping cries at every thrust, utterly overwhelmed.

Watson took Holmes' mouth like a victor takes a prize, pushing in with his tongue and claiming as though there were no greater taste as the taste of Holmes. 

Holmes had to tear away, to moan aloud, panting and gasping and dizzy, as he felt the crisis approach. 

Watson's completion, when it came, came as a tidal wave; inevitable and massive and devastating. He called out Holmes' name, and buried his teeth to the soft skin above his collarbone as though that might stifle the immense force. It wracked through him like a storm that hits the rocky cliffs, overflowing his veins and his body until he felt torn apart, and ruined, and never more satisfied. 

Nearly frantic, Holmes wrenched his hands down to fit between them but Watson, still shivering and pulsing, closed his hand around Holmes' wet prick first and brought him off in quick, hard strokes, still rocking his hips to the rhythm of his pounding heartbeat. 

They stayed like that, shuddering, shivering, tied together for an age, and neither of them made to pull away. Holmes wrapped his arms tight around Watson's trembling back, legs around his hips to keep him in. Watson dug his fingers into Holmes hair and his teeth hard enough to bruise into Holmes' shoulder as he shook, feeling the last slivers of pleasure tingle through him.

He kissed the bite marks gently, apologetically, when he finally withdrew, nosing up the side of Holmes' jaw to press incoherent, chaste kisses to his cheek and hairline. Watson rolled off and to the side and pulled Holmes with him, folding him into a soft, warm embrace, and they fell into sleep together.

In his dreams he was running through black streets of London. The lights were all out, the houses empty, but he knew the paths he walked with Holmes by the scent of filth and mud.

There was something behind him.

It was running too; and faster. 

He tripped over a low curb, and fell beneath the cruel bite and savage claws of a wolf. 

It ripped out his belly and when he shouted, it opened his throat so he could not scream. Its muzzle, long and snarling, glistened ruby red as it dug inside him and feasted on his insides.

It ate his stomach and he hungered.

It ate his lungs and he could not speak.

It lifted its huge black head and stared at him with enormous yellow eyes. It said something in a human tongue, though its bloody, spit-flecked jaws did not move, but he could not understand, for it had eaten his words and his mind.

It ate his eyes and his tongue, and he lost sight of the man he had once been.

Then it began to eat his heart.

Watson woke with the tang of copper on his tongue and his breath caught up in his throat where it cut like barbed wire. The darkness lingered in his mind with hollow yellow eyes.

He checked to make sure Holmes was still asleep as he rose and finally washed the sticky remnants of dried blood from his skin. He was nearly thankful; Holmes had obviously not slept those past several nights, from the hollowness of his cheeks and the shadows beneath his eyes. While this was the detective's usual habit whilst on a case, it never failed to make Watson worry for his friend, who was negligent at best and actively destructive at worst when it came to his health and self-care. 

But the bruises and marks that covered Holmes' pale skin, inflicted without thought or care, made Watson pale to see, and he could not disturb Holmes' sleep to care for them, as there was no guarantee he would rest again that week. And still, the scent of sex and blood made his heart shudder in his chest and hunger churn in the pit of his belly. 

Mrs Hudson was out again; Holmes had sent her away for the rest of the week, so that no harm of any kind might befall her, either in the moralistic sense or physical. Watson ate a cold sandwich of yesterday's roast chicken and bread, and it did nothing to diminish his apatite.

Then he sat, and waited, and watched Holmes breathe; silent and steady, as though he was truly at peace.

 

"You should not blame yourself," said Holmes, taking the soft cloth from Watson and tending to the blood that stuck to his skin in flaky patches. "If anything, you might blame me: I enjoyed myself immensely, and would not in the least feel ashamed at enticing you into an encore; albeit perhaps on another day."

Watson applied a salve to the worst of the bruises with gentle fingers, rubbing in until the marks ached and tingled. A bite here, on the collarbone, another on the rounded curve of Holmes' shoulder; deep impressions of his fingertips on Holmes' narrow sides and hips. "Sherlock, you know what I am," he said, without raising his gaze or stopping in his work. "I am a monster."

Holmes denied it vehemently. "You are a man. I have seen monsters, as near as they come to true evil: you are none of these."

Watson stood, sighing and shaking his head. Holmes rose as well to finish dressing, hiding the hitch in his step. "Tonight is the last this month. Three nights, Müller said. So tomorrow you will be yourself, and we shall have a month to figure this out, dear boy." It was meant as reassurance, though he did not miss Watson's flinch at the thought of the change reoccurring the following month.

"Holmes?" called Watson, from the other side of the room. "Take this with you tonight." He offered his service revolver, although Holmes himself had his own pistol at hand.

"Watson, I am perfectly capable of protecting myself," Holmes said, bemused. "Besides, the entire Scotland Yard police force cannot be as bad a shot as all that – one of them at least is likely to hit the target, if only through sheer blind luck."

Watson gave him a pointed look. "Just take it, will you, old boy?" 

"Very well."

"And this." Watson held out a closed fist. Holmes, eyebrows lifted to his hairline, stretched his open palm beneath the fist for receiving. A small clatter of bullets poured out of Watson's fist; six for one full round of the revolver. 

Holmes peered at them closely. "These are pure silver."

Watson nodded.

"Where on Earth did you find these?"

"I had them made. This morning, before I returned. It's astounding, the variety of people you meet running about on the arm of Sherlock Holmes. Or perhaps, the efficiency with with they complete the tasks offered them, once your name has been bandied about."

"I suppose," Holmes mused, closing his fist around the burden Watson had laid upon him, "that if we consider the one portion of the myth to be true, the rest may follow. I will take your walking stick as well. And... I will see you tomorrow?"

"Yes, Holmes."

"Well then. I am to meet Lestrade at six o'clock. We have a force of constables available for the protection of Herr Müller, for we will not be the only ones upon his trail tonight."

"It is nearly quarter-past-five now," said Watson, glancing instinctively at the clock. It had fallen the previous night; although not visibly broken the gears must have slipped out of alignment, for the hands were firmly fixed on a half-past-ten.

"So eager to see me go?"

"I am eager for you to finish this, Holmes. Only I do not like you going into danger without myself at your side."

"Ah. Please: I may not have you, but I have your protections to keep me safe," said Holmes, showing off unnecessarily the revolver and cartridges. "There must be a kind of magic in that, wouldn't you think?"

Watson huffed, an involuntary breath of laughter that could not be helped, and sat himself on the bed, stripped of its coverings. He looked up at Holmes with the adoration he could never manage to hide, his eyes soft and his moustache quirked with a gentle smile. "As you say."

Holmes bent to kiss him; Watson's lips were trembling against his, but he returned it with nearly the conviction that Holmes had. Then Holmes left, turning only to lock the door behind him, and was gone in the night.


	4. Chapter 4

_The way you walked was thorny,_  
 _through no fault of your own,_  
 _but as the rain enters the soil,_  
 _the river enters the sea,  
_ _so tears run to a predestined end._

\- The Wolf Man (1941)

* * *

The former residence of John Lawrence and Claude Talbot was an isolated house on the western edges of Hampstead for the Heath, a half-hour ride from Baker Street, which Sherlock Holmes took in relative silence in the fine company of Inspector Lestrade and the Constables Perry and Marshall, one an acute observer, the other a decent reasoner – together making up approximately one efficient policeman.

Lawrence's home was a three-storey English Baroque manor house in the original Queen Anne style, not the modern revival nonsense that had the same name attached. The red bricks and flat-surfaced white sash windows stood out against the dusky haze of night, just beginning its encroachment over the Heath.

The police wagon pulled to a halt outside the wrought-iron gate, and Holmes alighted first, already setting off up the path through the garden before the others had climbed down themselves. 

He could see the disrepair that the house had fallen into in subtle, but significant places. The roses untended, the grass sporadically cut; clearly the gardener had been an early loss, and the caretaker could not be bothered. The windows had a smeary quality to them that indicated the cleaning was less often than it should have been, and less thorough. The sashes, although white and brilliant even in the dim light, were chipped and peeling about the corners and had not been repainted in several years. A single window on the ground floor was illuminated by the faint, inconsistent glow of a fire.

"Are you sure he's here?"

"Of course. Müller has left his marks," Holmes declared, indicating the distinctive marking of the German's shoe prints in the soft dirt before the step. "I assumed he would come here to draw Weiß away from his hotel; we are in an isolated enough area that such havoc he could create might possibly be contained."

"Weiß is the owner of the wild dog?" asked Constable Perry, with a frown on his large red face.

Holmes exchanged a brief glance with Lestrade, who was also frowning, which made his little ratty face crumple unpleasantly. "More or less," he said, with a unconvincing shrug. "Ulric Weiß: dog owner with a taste for vengeance."

"Great. Just what we need," Marshall muttered, shoving his hands into his coat pockets and shivering. The air was growing distinctly cooler, Holmes could admit; he had begun to see his breath steaming in front of him in faint puffs.

"Come along. We must be inside before the moon rises." They struck around the side of the house, bypassing the sweep of stone steps and the front entrance in favour of the basement door at the back. It was locked, but the Lestrade turned the constables away while Holmes fished about with his lock picks until it clicked, and opened into the dark kitchen.

Lestrade uncovered the dark lantern he had brought along with him, the smell of hot tin filling the small room quickly as it had not outside, but the illumination revealed little but long empty tables and dishes; useless now that the master was a month dead and gone.

There was a creak from the floor above them, and the sound of footsteps over hard wood floors; away, and back, and away again.

"Ten minutes," said Lestrade, reading his pocket watch by the lantern's glow.

"We should confront Müller now," insisted Perry in a hiss, "Get him to safety before the madman with the dog gets here."

"If we were going to confront Müller before the villain, don't you think we might have arrived via the front door? Rather than, for example, this dank basement?" Holmes did not even look away from the ceiling to offer his criticism. His eyes tracked the creaking floorboards, the fine dust raining down, the hollow clump of shoes.

"Well what, then?"

"If we were to remove Müller from the premises, regardless of his willingness to go, the hound at Ulric's beck and call would undoubtedly be able to trace him. He has found his other targets with unerring accuracy: each victim chased away from the public eye, on nights they were not following any routine in particular. Also consider: Müller came here, specifically, to die tonight. His time is up in his mind, and he is sacrificing him to the memory of Adelaide Weiß, and the future her son has thrown away."

Perry was silent after that, watching the floor with his fingers laced, waiting for his signal. Their time was marked by easternmost basement window, just above the level of the grass, catching the pale glint of the risen moon.

The cry came from the back of the house, over the vast expanse of green that made up the rear grounds; low and harrowing it made the skin prickle and the hairs on the back of Lestrade's neck rise.

"Dear Lord, that's no dog," Marshall whispered, crossing himself impulsively.

"It is our man, though," Holmes said, positively vibrating with fierce excitement. "Quickly now!"

They crept up the stairs to the kitchen door into the house, heavy dark wood that swung open at a touch for easy access and positioned themselves at the crack, waiting. An enormous thump and the horrendous crash of breaking glass; then the slow muffled tread of four enormous paws.

Holmes could hear Müller's quaking voice, but he was too busy throwing open the door and hurrying the constables after him to translate from the German. 

"Hold it there: we are the police!" cried Constable Perry, his pistol raised and aimed at the room in general.

Müller had taken up his nights post in the long hall on the eastern side of the central passage, two sets of double doors framing it on either end. The room was cluttered with furniture; plushly upholstered arm chairs and settees, ornate tables and lamps, but all of them with an edge of the-uncared-for. The dust had begun to settle in the crevasses and spill out into the main surfaces of the room; the floor, the tables, all shining wood covered over with inattention. A small fire burned in the grate, unsteady and flickering, built by unpractised hands. Moonlight spilled in and caught the motes in the air, combating the warmth of the fire with its cold pale glow.

Müller himself was pressed against the side table at the distant end of the room; on the near end the wolf prowled nearer. It was a prayer, Holmes realized, listening closer to Müller's fervid mumbling, an entreaty that all sins be wiped clean.

It was entirely too late for that, but there could be another type of salvation if they were quick enough. "Go," he snapped, slapping Marshall on the back and urging him to cross the room to Müller. Holmes raised Watson's revolver, cursing the experiment he was being forced to make – no evidence but speculation, no data on the matter but superstition – and fired.

The wolf dropped like a stone.

Perry and Lestrade immediately followed Marshall across the room, joining him in attempting to convince Müller to leave the room, hide, and bodily force him if need be. Holmes kept the revolver trained on the wolf.

Müller was ranting, half-mad with fright, fighting against the constables as they drug him from the sight of the wolf. The beast shuddered, not killed, not nearly, but wounded yes and mad.

"Run!" shouted Holmes. He aimed again and shot, but missed the heart of the wolf as it lurched its way back to its feet. It fell again, into a heaving mass of dark fur.

Still it was not enough, for the beast dragged itself upright once more and continued its stalk in giant, limping steps, between the furniture and ever closer.

Holmes realized as the enormous animal moved toward him, that there were distinct differences between this and the only other of its kind that he had witnessed. This was black, deathly black, the firelight nearly sinking in to the coarse denseness of its fur, moonlight slipping over the edges. It was massive, larger than the other by a hand at least, but inherently frail, with a narrow muzzle, and hollow sides; starved, perhaps? Or merely negligent, perhaps the bearing of the person had a greater influence upon the wolf than the instinct to kill. 

The other wolf had been a mottled tawny colour, with broader, blunt features, a sloping back and a heavily muscled neck. It had not seemed, even in close confines, nearly so large as this, but it had its own presence that was reinforced by the strong musculature and the large, heavy teeth.

Significant differences to be sure, he thought as the wolf lunged and he dove out of the door way and into the central passage, something to think over more at a later date.

He slammed the doors shut and there was an almighty crash, the doors shuddering under the full impact of the hound as its leap was cut short. 

"Go, get out. Take Müller, get him out of here!" shouted Holmes, revolver still raised. The door shook as the wolf threw its weight against it again; he could hear snarling and the scrabbling of sharp claws against wood.

"We can't," protested Constable Marshall, panic in his voice.

Holmes turned at the absurd notion and saw the problem.

"I did not wish you to follow me," said Müller in a low, hopeless moan. 

He had barricaded the door entirely, with tables and dressers and, Holmes observed, as many things he could drag down the hall and place in front of the door. They were surely moveable, but would take far too long to dismantle the whole mess, and the crack of the lock told him their time was running short.

"Quickly, back through the basement, then," he hissed, and grabbed Müller's arm to aid in hurrying him along.

They were too late; the wolf had made the same decision, and sprang from the sitting room before them, between them and the kitchen door. It had lost much of its flare for the dramatic in the intervening time, and did not bother with the prowling stalk, but flew at them immediately, jaws snapping.

They fled. Up the stairs was their only option, and Holmes ushered the others up first before taking them two-at-a-time. 

It was immensely dark on the first floor; barely any light from the ground floor escaped up the steps, and upon realization Lestrade cursed loudly. "I've dropped the lantern! We are lost."

"Just keep moving; we may jump out the second storey window if we must," Holmes hissed in reply. The wolf was behind them, and they scattered; Holmes down the hall to the back of the house to find a way out, Lestrade around the corner to the front, where he might alert the second batch of constables who should have arrived. Marshall and Perry hauled Müller between them into one of the bedrooms off the main hall and slammed the door behind them but they could not close it fast enough.

Between the frame and the panel, the wolf was there, and it would not be deterred. Perry heaved back, the larger of the two, to try and force retreat, crushing the wolf's snarling head in the gap.

"Put your back into it, man," Marshall snapped, his shoulder braced to keep the door from opening farther at least, but his shoes were old and the soles worn down; they slipped on the smooth surface of the floor, and he struggled to keep his footing.

Outside the door the wolf rose upon its hind legs and barrelled at the door with the force of a battering ram, slamming again and again into the fragile wood until the constables strength failed under the onslaught, and they collapsed backward as the door crashed open.

The wolf was salivating, bloody spit and foam dripping from its jaws, teeth bared in a horrifying grin. As the constables herded Müller back, into a corner, placing themselves between him and the wolf with only the basest instinct guiding their valour, the wolf stalked closer on silent paws. The limp did not hinder it, although its wounds were smoking very slightly, casting faint curls of smoke into the beams of moonlight that filled the room.

When it lunged, it thrust Perry aside and into a chest of drawers, knocking them over. Marshall fell beneath enormous claws, raking down his side and swiping his revolver from his hands. He collapsed with a shout of pain, curling in on himself, and the wolf trained its yellow eyes on Müller.

The old man made no effort to protect himself; not to run away nor to fight the beast off. He lifted his hands in supplication, and looked into the eyes of the wolf. 

"Ulric. Ulric wird deiner Vergeltung durchgeführt," he gasped, anguish rattling in his voice like . "Bitte, können Sie sich jetzt ausruhen. Lassen Sie es zu beenden." The wolf padded closer, showing bloody teeth. Low rumbling growls, like the sound of distant thunder, echoed in the dark room. "Please, let it end."

Marshall and Perry drew together, watching in horror as the wolf claimed for itself its victim, helpless to stop it as cries and shrieks rang out from Müller. The wolf took him by the throat with its enormous teeth and tossed him about like a broken doll, then threw him aside.

He landed in a crumpled heap, limp and bleeding, still alive and gasping but not for long. "It is done, Ulric," he whispered, upon his final breath.

The wolf turned its gaze upon the constables, and they knew it was not finished. Perry hauled Marshall to his feet and dragged him bodily from the room, shouting desperately. From the ground floor the bright glow of flames said that the Inspector's lantern had not fallen intact. They could smell smoke building in the hall, creeping inexorably up the stairs.

"This way, run!" yelled Lestrade, beckoning from a room farther down the hall. They made for it and slammed the door before the wolf could follow. Behind them it had grown mindless in its rage. It flew at every door it came upon, smashing them to splinters, working its way down the hall from the stair landing.

Holmes too was inside, in the dark, struggling to open the window; the paint had sealed the sash shut under several coats of thick whitewash, further evidence of the kind of neglect the whole family had inflicted upon themselves and each other, and the window would not budge. 

"Come on, man, heave!"

"I am doing," grunted Holmes, adrenalin making him snap, "the very best I can."

"Marshall, good Lord, sit there. Perry, help Mr Holmes with the window. Holmes... give me your revolver."

Holmes shoved the pistol at him with a fierce look in his eyes. "Do not miss."

There was a sudden crash; Constable Perry had opened the window by ignoring the paint-sealed edges and hefted a lamp through the glass. He used his coat as padding to break off the sharpest peaks left, sending them tinkling down into the garden below. "It's a long drop, inspector," he said, terror making his voice shake.

The door cracked behind them, a screech of metal tearing as the hinges bent under the weight of the wolf. 

"We will survive," said Holmes. "Quickly now."

Perry dropped first, landing with a tumble and a swear in the grass. He limped to his feet, and looked up to try and brace for the second, but they never came.

Marshall was halfway out the window when the wolf broke through, and skidded into the room on all fours, teeth and claws and rage all exposed. It leapt at Lestrade, who fired the pistol, knocking the wolf aside and into Holmes. He fell back, over a writing desk hidden in the darkness; it came down upon his leg, trapping him.

The wolf snarled, for it was not dead. "Again, shoot it again! In the heart, for God's sake!" Holmes shouted, decorum thrust aside, as he tried to free himself from the sharp corner of the desk.

"You'd think," said the inspector hysterically, "that three bullets would drop him. But no."

A sudden howling echoed through the house. The wolf froze, half back on its feet. It swung its huge head to the doorway, ears darting back, yellow eyes narrowed and hollow with dilated pupils. 

"There's another one," whispered Marshall. "Lord help us all."

The second wolf arrived in a flurry of sparks, carried upward with the rising flames of the dark lantern, smashed and spreading. Its eyes glowed in the new flames, brilliant gold and burning with anger. Its tawny coat was partially singed about the edges, but it was not too harmed to crouch and pounce without a seconds hesitation upon the black wolf.

They collided in a whirlwind of claws and teeth, snarling and ripping. Blood blossomed upon the floor in spatters, darkening the moonlit swaths and glinting; fur in the air drifted down like milkweed pods, strangely serene in the blue light as compared to the violence of the wolves.

"Lestrade, put the gun down!" pleaded Holmes over the fighting and barking.

"I'll do no such thing, Mr Holmes." Lestrade kept the silver-loaded pistol at the ready, sweat beading upon his brow and trickling down his back. He shivered, and did not look away, despite the horror at the sight. At any moment the wolves might turn their sights upon softer prey, and they had already lost the man they had intended to save, if Perry and Marshall's frantic flight was any indication. He would not lose another man that night, especially not Holmes. 

The tawny grey wolf, though smaller, was still stronger, more densely muscled, and better fed. It gained the upper hand, though injured and bleeding itself, grabbing the black wolf by the neck and hurling it across the room, into the dark. There was a whimper from the large black wolf, the strangest noise Holmes had heard all night, for until then there had been no indication that the black wolf even felt the pain of the silver bullets. The second wolf threw itself after, and the rest of the fight was lost to darkness. 

All they could hear was the snarls and growls, the yelps and crashes as they broke something large and wooden, that clattered and thumped as it fell. Outside the room the flames grew higher. Smoke began to roil in the moonlight, filling the room. 

A final cry from one of the wolves, and the fighting went silent.

All was breathless. 

Movement in the corner, and the hollow glow of two yellow eyes reflecting the cool moonlight.

A shot, and the wolf fell.

"No!" shouted Holmes, helpless beneath the desk. Constable Marshall turned around, startled by his cry, his service revolver still smoking in his hand. 

Lestrade held Marshall back with unforgiving hands and thrust him toward the window. "Go, man." He helped him climb, injured still as he was, and watched him fall into the grip of Constable Perry.

As soon as Marshall was gone, Lestrade was at Holmes' side, helping him throw the desk off. Holmes crawled on his hands and knees until he could get his feet under him, and even then he slipped in the scattered blood on the floor, his shoes sliding for a moment.

"No, Watson, no, please God." Holmes approached the enormous beast with trembling hands raised. 

The wolf, grey-brown fur slicked with red and sweat, shuddered and rolled over. It tucked its paws beneath it and tried to push up, but its leg was gravely injured, and it crumpled again briefly before gaining sure footing.

It lifted its head and stared Holmes down. He had gone too close; its face was not more than a foot away from him, muzzle dripping red, ear torn, eyes wide and shining. 

"Watson?" Holmes breathed. "My dear John."

"Holmes we must leave," said Lestrade in quiet desperation. "The fire is nearly here, if we do not get out now, there will be no saving any of us."

Holmes could smell the acrid smoke just as well. "I am not leaving him here to burn alive, Lestrade."

Lestrade was silent. 

"Then move."

He stepped past Holmes with quick, efficient motions. He'd rolled his sleeves up past the elbow, and was approaching the injured beast like he'd never been afraid in his life. He got close, and it snapped at him, growling.

"Watson, please," breathed Holmes. He approached from the other side, and between them, he and Lestrade hauled the enormous wolf up like it was an unwieldy piece of luggage. It struggled, and thrashed in their arms, and snapped at them viciously but made no move to bite them.

They hauled the wolf to the window and, without a single better idea, dropped it. Constable Perry, who had been waiting below to catch the Inspector or Mr Holmes, threw himself backwards with a shout, but the wolf landed heavily on its feet in a pained, awkward crouch. In moments it had risen fully and sprinted away across the green expanse of the heath. 

"Oi, it's getting away! Inspector!" cried Perry, not particularly willing to chase it down on his own.

"Leave it," called Lestrade, one foot out the window and hovering uncomfortably. "Come help me down. Mr Holmes has an injured leg."

Perry received them both with minimal additional bruising.

"What happened? That wasn't the wolf that attacked us," he asked once they were upon the road again and waiting for the fire brigade. Marshall had fallen asleep, wrapped tightly in Perry and Holmes' outer coats.

Lestrade opened his mouth and stopped there, thinking.

"A dog," said Holmes, interrupting. "Fighting for its territory. I'd dare say it lives in the area, didn't like the sound of an interloper. Must have an owner somewhere nearby who would hate to see it dead."

Lestrade shut his mouth and nodded sagely. The night was alive around them; the roar of fire and the shrill, biting touch of wind. They were each brightly lit with eerie blues and warm yellows, strange shadows dancing about their legs. The heath glinted slightly in the moonlight, for the frosts had come some time in the darkness, and the great expanse was icy cold. Holmes shivered.

"So... Müller is gone," Lestrade mused, after another long silence.

"Nikolaus Müller gave himself over to his death long before he arrived at this house tonight. It is a tragedy, but I doubt we could have done anything to assist him. Nothing, at least, that he would have accepted," said Holmes gravely. He had a frown upon his thin, sharp face, eyebrows drawn down in remorse. He bit his lip. "If only it could have ended differently."

"But it is over now," Lestrade said. He hesitated. "Is it?"

"Very nearly," said Holmes. "Ah, there we are. The response time is really something you must encourage them to work on, Lestrade, this is abysmal."

 

Watson woke up in bed. Not his bed – nor Holmes', which while rare for the sake of discretion did happen on occasion, and was always slightly disorienting – but a hospital bed in Saint Bartholomew's.

"Are you awake, then?" asked a no-nonsense Scottish voice.

Watson turned to see a doctor standing by the sectional curtain. "Yes?" he said, unable to help the inclination of his voice.

"Not too sure of it, are we?"

"Yes, thank you. I'm fine." Watson sat up and almost fainted, for the pain in his head was exceptional. His left arm was bound tight to his body with a sling, his shoulder afire with agony; his abdomen and legs– everything hurt. He felt as though he had been hit by a train.

"I am Doctor Tanner, and you are a very lucky man," said the doctor. "Officer Jones ran across you lying in the street this morning about sunrise, looking like you'd been rolled by every street gang in London. Stripped, penniless, beaten bloody – watch the bump on your head there," he warned too late, as Watson found the goose-egg behind his ear and grey spots bloomed in his vision. "Barely recognized you, but so he did and brought you in straight away. Any idea who did this to you? They'll be wanting to know."

Watson did not shake his head. "No, I'm terribly sorry. It was dark; I couldn't see a thing." It was a terrible lie, and he knew it as surely as he felt his face heating with blush. The doctor hmm'd and wrote something on his clipboard. "Now there'll be none of that. A concussion is nothing with a little rest and proper tending," Watson scolded the doctor, who raised one thick eyebrow.

"Doctor Watson, infamous biographer you might be, but today you are a patient. And you'll be treated as a patient, no matter how terrible a patient you prove. Patient displays signs of aggression," he dictated as he wrote, peeking to see if Watson was paying attention, "and impertinence when interacting with his doctor."

Watson scowled and folded his arms, but did not protest further.

"Has anybody contacted Holmes?" he asked, when Doctor Tanner had finished checking his pupils. 

"Oh, somebody's on it, surely. Let's have a feel at your throat then. Lymph nodes are normal. You're doing much better than we'd thought you'd do; well done."

"Thank you," groused Watson, trying not to crane his head away from blunt, invasive hands. "Send someone to 221B Baker Street and fetch Sherlock Holmes."

"Alright, alright. Soon as I'm done here, I promise." Doctor Tanner poked and prodded at him until he was satisfied, and then left, sternly warning Watson to rest.

To Watson's surprise the doctor apparently carried through on his promise, for Holmes came dashing through the curtains less than an hour later. He threw himself upon the bed beside Watson's knees and managed to breathe one heartfelt "Thank God," before Doctor Tanner followed him.

"How are you feeling, dear boy?"

"I feel fine, Holmes. I'm alright," Watson insisted. He chanced a casual pat on the hand, but Holmes' pale fingers caught him up and gripped him tight, until his knuckles turned white and Watson had to hide a wince. "Really, I'm perfectly well." He squeezed back, and said, quietly and seriously, "I'm sorry if I scared you."

"He's not fine," announced Doctor Tanner, in direct and deliberate contradiction. "He was brought in with a cracked skull, two broken ribs, a number of serious bruises to the abdomen, one gunshot wound to the left shoulder resulting in a fractured clavicle and shattered scapula, and a concussion."

"What, all that?" blurted Watson. He'd not lied to Holmes. He had been sitting in the bed for an hour by himself, and was feeling quite healthy indeed. His head still hurt a bit, but even that had mellowed out to a dull ache. 

"I said that's what you were brought in with." The doctor leaned in and poked Watson sharply in the ribs. Watson yelped, involuntarily, but did not flinch in pain. "Left lateral ribs, numbers eight and nine, fractured, with four lateral lacerations across the abdominal skin; none of which seem to be causing Doctor Watson any trouble at the moment," the doctor read from his notes. He looked up. "I'd assume your shoulder's still feeling peaky, but not terrible." Watson nodded reluctantly. "I don't know how to explain it, gentlemen, but your man's a bloody miracle. Are you ready to go?"

Holmes held Watson's arm the whole carriage ride home, even after Watson protested the invalid treatment. 

The second time he said this Holmes snorted. "If you really think that is my primary motivation, your skills of observation and deduction are worse than I had previously realized."

Watson flushed, first with affront then with pleasure. Holmes never did anything without reason, even in the blackest of moods. He patted Holmes' hand with his opposite, and held him a little tighter.

Upon alighting at Baker Street, Holmes insisted on following Watson into the bathing room and drawing him a bath. At this Watson put his foot down. He relished the extra attention, and always cherished Holmes' demonstrations of affection, for they were rare and quick in passing, but to have Holmes dote upon him, serve him like that, was too far.

"Holmes, please. Calm yourself. You may sit there and observe if it will ease your mind, but I will have none of this prostration. Here, sit here." He pulled a stool up to the edge of the tub and pressed Holmes down upon it. 

Watson undressed perfunctorily, and without blushing, although Holmes' gaze burned hot upon his skin. Disrobing did give him more trouble than normal, for his arm was still tightly bound, and ached when he moved it. Once he was naked he unwound the bandage, and immediately felt cool fingers against the newly bared skin of his shoulder, trailing across his back. It felt as though Holmes were tracing something.

He was. "I thought he'd killed you."

"I'm alright." Watson felt an automaton, repeating himself endlessly. He turned and Holmes' hand slipped across his skin to his chest. He curled his fist, and his fingernails scratched at pale hairs. "Sherlock, I am whole and well. Besides, it wasn't a silver one, was it?"

Holmes made a face, still running his fingers over the violently red mark upon Watson's skin. It was alarmingly close to his heart, just beneath the outward curve of his collarbone. "I'm not quite sure it would have made a difference; the experiment was largely inconclusive. All rumour and not nearly enough actual data."

"Really? So they were no use at all?" Watson looked disappointed. He'd spent quite a bit of money and melted down a very nice silver teapot to gain those.

"They may have, but again: not enough evidence." Holmes smirked. "The legend is either exactingly true or entirely false. My aim is not as good as yours, after all."

Watson laughed. "Luckily, neither is Marshall's. Better, I think, to have no proof either way than definitive proof in the negative."

Holmes lost his smirk and frowned with tumultuous grey eyes. "Much better."

Watson cupped Holmes' sallow cheeks in his hands and lifted his face to meet him eye-to-eye. He brushed his thumb across his high cheekbone, let his fingers card through black hair, and relished in the gentle scrape of stubble across the palms of his hands, for it meant that Holmes had started for the hospital without completing his toilet. Watson always enjoyed it when he distracted Holmes. 

He pulled Holmes' lips to his, the kiss sweet and reassuring and achingly soft. Holmes sighed against his mouth; Watson could feel the brush of his long eyelashes against his own skin in minute, teasing flutters that meant he had closed his eyes. Watson's own eyes had slipped shut the moment they had touched.

"Well," said Holmes, not bothering to draw back and separate their mouths, but speaking directly against Watson's lips with an indistinct mumble. "Go on then. I drew you a bath you did not want, but you would not waste the water, would you?"

Watson chuckled and stepped into the deep copper tub. He sat, knees curled to his chest, and soaked in the warm water. Holmes' potent, watchful gaze did not shift the whole time Watson bathed. It was incredibly distracting.

When Watson stood, dripping and flushed from the heat, Holmes once again laid his hands to warm, pink skin, as though he couldn't resist the magnetic draw of the scars, stark white and shining like they were years old.

"It is a wonder. They do not hurt?"

"Nothing terrible. The shoulder aches a bit, though the heat helped with that."

"If the pattern holds, I would say you'll be fit as a fiddle by dinner," Holmes mused. He pressed his lips to a dreadful snarl, then wrapped him in a warm towel, patting the water droplets from his skin with excessive care. He folded him into a dressing gown and led him to the sitting room. A bright fire was already built, and tea was upon the table, suggesting Mrs Hudson had been and gone.

"Holmes." Watson was hesitating. Holmes followed his line of thought by the movement of his eyes, across the oriental rug by the fire and the new, distinct claw marks in the once beautiful woven pattern. "I am truly sorry. A thousand times, I am sorry."

"My dear Watson, I believe you have misconstrued the situation. I should apologize to you, for bringing you to such danger in the first place. If I had not... If I had left you behind, you would not face the troubles you have found yourself ensconced in today. However, if you do forgive me: I repeat, and will again and again for all and sundry, I will see you through this." He took up Watson's hands in his and squeezed, making Watson look him dead in the eye. Watson made the vaguest attempt at resistance, but he could not help the draw of Holmes' gaze. "We will survive. If anything, I can think of a multitude of nice tunnels to stash you in come the full moon, if that's what you're worried about. Have I told you how you can run for miles and miles beneath the city and never come across another living soul? Why if you practised, you might learn them as well as I have." He smiled, with a sad sort of optimism, his narrow brow furrowed but his eyes light and clear. 

"Of course. The tunnels sound very nice, indeed."

"Indeed. So sit here, and know you are safe with me" said Holmes, gesturing to the settee. As Watson sat, smiling soppily and unable to help it, Holmes went to fetch his violin. He rosined the bow, plinking at the strings, and played several scales while watching Watson intently.

"What would you hear, my boy?"

"Whatever you would play, I should be glad to listen," said Watson, ruining the joviality of Holmes' playful scraping with his earnest eyes and unveiled heart.

Holmes looked down and smiled, as if to himself. Then he set bow to stings, and played until the sun set, and the waning moon had risen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH GOD WHAT IS THAT ENDING OH WELL


End file.
